Bid in Lords to overturn move to decriminalise abortion for women

What im saying regarding the upshot is that for example if laws are written with good intentions but actually result in unfairness, then they are no good as laws and need rewriting. In the same vein if a moral principle held by a society only creates distress and suffering then doesn't it need revisiting? As pp said what was the point of moralising homosexuality? What is the point of morality? One is 'taking a life' whether the abortion is early, late or embryos not implanted during IVF are destroyed.

Why is it obviously wrong that a child going into care from birth would be better off aborted, if its own mother actually wants to abort it? (Clearly Im not talking about a third party taking that decision.)

I don't understand how this will work in practice.

Late self inflicted abortions will produce a dead baby. Probably in the family home.

If this cannot be investigated, due to potential distress, what is stopping someone having a home birth and killing the baby 2 days later?

What if the drugs dont kill the foetus but do cause the birth of a live baby and then it dies because of neglect?

What about all the other distressing deaths that might occur in the family home (clumsy 3 yo fell down the stairs again!) Should they be ignored also?

As an aside not all adopted children have such horrendous lives that being aborted would have been a better option.

I don't think most of them are. But I think some of them will be.

But I'm not sure I trust an American study on abortions after 20 weeks, nor do I think it's particularly applicable given the difficulty for women to access or fund abortion in the USA, with ability to pay, lack of insurance, and access, all being labelled as contributing factors.

I will note however that one of the quoted studies says:

"Later abortion recipients experienced logistical delays (e.g., difficulty finding a provider and raising funds for the procedure and travel costs), which compounded other delays in receiving care. Most women seeking later abortion fit at least one of five profiles: They were raising children alone, were depressed or using illicit substances, were in conflict with a male partner or experiencing domestic violence, had trouble deciding and then had access problems, or were young and nulliparous."

So, do we want to force women who are mostly either young, in poverty, experiencing domestic violence, depressed, on drugs, or single mothers, to give birth, when they don't want the child, but most likely won't give it up for adoption? Do we think that it will it benefit anyone to criminalise late term abortion? Or would approaching the situation from a health and social support perspective be more useful?

Foetuses are lives that deserve to be saved and to kill them is (nigh on) murder...unless their father was a rapist, in which case they deserve to die for his crimes

I think it’s a good litmus test. There are many pro-lifers who don’t think rape is enough reason for abortion. These are the ‘real’ pro-lifers in my view.

Then we’ve got those who think it’s okay in the case of rape, which seems like a ‘you must suffer the consequences of your actions’ type of deal, where it’s more about female responsibility. I don’t think it’s a very defensible position, but it is reflected in red American state legislation a lot as a compromise position.

I don’t think we need to maintain an absolutist position on bodily autonomy, I think it’s enough to give the vast majority a chance to opt out of motherhood, helping the greatest number of women whilst preventing the most severe abuses (eg Carla Foster)

What is it you do not understand about a foetus or a near full term baby being a separate life? That it has depended on the mother to survive up until a certain point does not negate its 'otherness'.

The idea that having a degree of respect and maybe even awe for the miracle of pregnancy, new life and birth is not 'misogyny'. Some people use that term too readily, and it loses all its meaning. It seems to mean ( the way you are employing it) anything that impinges on what an individual woman wants to do.

So I presume you're against any abortion, then, if you're outright saying that women don't have bodily autonomy, and shouldn't have choice when it comes to pregnancy?

As for the rest of your argument:

But why don't we ensure that all humans donate blood and bone marrow when needed, whether they want to or not, to save lives, then? It's much, much, much less invasive, and would save the lives of so many people, with families and lives.

When bodily autonomy comes up against a foetus living or dying, you think bodily autonomy loses, right? So to be morally consistent, you'd have to be in favour of enforced blood and bone marrow donations that will save people's lives.

If you're not, then it's just misogyny driving your thought process, plain and simple.

Can you enlighten me what would happen in a 'self abortion' - do you just take a magic pill and a full term pregnancy disappears.
Where are the safeguards against coerced abortions. I've known plenty that entail a kick in the stomach or a fall downstairs.

Can you enlighten me what would happen in a 'self abortion' - do you just take a magic pill and a full term pregnancy disappears.
Where are the safeguards against coerced abortions. I've known plenty that entail a kick in the stomach or a fall downstairs.

That's not true in the case of late term self abortions. But yes, in legal late term abortions for medical or other reasons, I believe they do stop the foetus's heart and induce labour, after which the baby is birthed in the usual way.

Why is it obviously wrong that a child going into care from birth would be better off aborted, if its own mother actually wants to abort it? (Clearly Im not talking about a third party taking that decision

It feels eugenics-adjacent to a lot of people: like you are explicitly saying that it’s better off to not exist at all than to exist as a poor person or in a neglectful home (standards of which is going to be different due to cultural backgrounds as well).

Even I wouldn’t go as far as this. But it was the assumption of Margaret Sanger and other early 20th century eugenicists that you wanted to suppress the birth rates of ‘unfit’ people. I am conflicted: I wonder why we don’t just sterilize women who are homeless and/or severely mentally ill, who have child after child because they are unable or unwilling to prevent it. People will say it’s discriminatory towards the poor. But yet, attitudes like the above reveal that people really do think that it’s better to not exist than to be born into poverty or an unstable, neglectful home.

Well human morality is inconsistent. Unless we are forced into a very strict religious perspective, we will all have very different ideas of where lines should be drawn.

Even on a thread full of feminists, there will be lively arguments in this space. Back in my home country, there are literally pro-life feminists (usually rabidly Catholic, but it is a whole thing)

When bodily autonomy comes up against a foetus living or dying, you think bodily autonomy loses, right?

Yes. Within the parameters currently legislated for. I do not believe bodily autonomy as a philosophical belief is absolute and/or applicable equally in all scenarios.

No doctor will abort a healthy child after 24 weeks for you.

That's not true. They will do so to prevent grave physical or mental injury to the mother, regardless of the foetus's health.

I do have to wonder though, in regards to this thread in general, why laws around abortion and a woman's bodily autonomy are so inconsistently and misogynistically applied, even by feminists.

Bodily autonomy is sacrosanct and people can't even be forced to give blood to save a full-blown life...unless a woman or girl is pregnant, in which case she loses her bodily autonomy to a twenty-five week foetus.

Foetuses are lives that deserve to be saved and to kill them is (nigh on) murder...unless their father was a rapist, in which case they deserve to die for his crimes.

None of it is consistent.

So I presume you're against any abortion, then, if you're outright saying that women don't have bodily autonomy, and shouldn't have choice when it comes to pregnancy?

As for the rest of your argument:

But why don't we ensure that all humans donate blood and bone marrow when needed, whether they want to or not, to save lives, then? It's much, much, much less invasive, and would save the lives of so many people, with families and lives.

When bodily autonomy comes up against a foetus living or dying, you think bodily autonomy loses, right? So to be morally consistent, you'd have to be in favour of enforced blood and bone marrow donations that will save people's lives.

If you're not, then it's just misogyny driving your thought process, plain and simple.

You're basically saying that past a certain point of gestation, a woman or girl should have her bodily autonomy stripped away, and no longer have the same rights as any other person. There is no other situation in which people have their bodily autonomy stripped away in order to save a life - no mandatory blood, bone marrow, or organ donation. So why should women have this inflicted on them

You don’t have ‘bodily autonomy’ to demand an abortion at any gestation though. Thats just your personal values, but it’s not reflected in law. No doctor will abort a healthy child after 24 weeks for you.

It just doesn’t punish you any longer for taking it into your own hands and trying to terminate your own child at an advanced stage of pregnancy, which I find kind of horrible tbh. They could have squared this circle by stopping pills by post, but alas, they have not.

Sorry to go back in the thread but I have been thinking about this since yesterday and I also find it disturbing to read on a feminism board. In principle I get the 'with great power comes great responsibility' line but biologically and societally women do not have power and less so when pregnant. I agree that on a population level women have a unique and central role in human life; but they are more than 'carriers' of life, they are creators, bestowers, sustainers and nurturers of human life. A foetus is literally made out of the food a woman eats and her flesh, bone and blood. If a pregnant woman dies, her foetus dies in minutes without her oxygenated blood. I dont think that pregnancy is treated with such reverential status in our society that would make even 'soft' social mores about a woman's 'duty to the child inside her' appropriate, let alone 'hard' rules permitting the state to have ownership of women's foetuses for 'the greater good of the species'. We dont live in tribal or particularly collectivist societies where there is a balance of burden/benefit regarding children. Men can literally ejaculate and walk away and not even be held to providing materially for their children, let alone care. Mumsnet is literally a testament to this unfairness. What about the charity Pregnant then Screwed. Why then should women at a certain point of gestation be stripped of their bodily autonomy by the state due to their 'unique status' when they are not even respected for it?

You're basically saying that past a certain point of gestation, a woman or girl should have her bodily autonomy stripped away, and no longer have the same rights as any other person. There is no other situation in which people have their bodily autonomy stripped away in order to save a life - no mandatory blood, bone marrow, or organ donation. So why should women have this inflicted on them?

She will have the same rights as any other WOMAN. There are no other situations that are comparable to pregnancy. Blood, bone marrow and organs are not independent life forms. Society doesn't 'inflict' this on women, biology does. If bodily autonomy really was a choice for women we'd bypass ALL of the biological bits and have the baby delivered by stork.

I think it is far more subtle than that.

The fact is that women are carriers of human life. Their biological function is to carry, feed and nurture that. In every society there are rituals associated with major life transitions: births, marriages and deaths. These rituals serve to bring people together and to unite around our common humanity. Symbolism is a natural outcome and a means of converying deeper moral, ethical or spiritual truths or longings.

Personally, feel that women ( as biological females) have a very particular role in the wider context of human society. Not everything is about individuals and their personal preferences and there will always be limits to individual autonomy. We are all part of a wider society and the human collective - and to that extent we all have duties towards that collective and towards each other. There are sanctions on taking life in all societies, and when life is taken there has to be an accepted process for doing that, and consequences for breaching that.

Legalised abortion recognises that women are individuals too - but also that there does need to be limits to the idea that you can do anything you like with what society agrees is precious and important. You don't own the developing child; you are the custodian of it.....even though up to a point you are free to decide whether to continue to carry that life.

Pushing the concept of individual autonomy and ownership to the extreme by way of saying that abortion right up until birth is totally the privilege and/or decsion of the woman is highly provocative and merely serves to generate a backlash. Most people, including women, understand that there needs to be limits and boundaries to the termination of human life - and sanctions for ignoring those boundaries.

This is an incredibly disturbing post. You've reduced women down to incubators - making it clear you think our 'role' is simply to be inseminated by men, and produce young, never mind our individual humanity.

You're basically saying that past a certain point of gestation, a woman or girl should have her bodily autonomy stripped away, and no longer have the same rights as any other person. There is no other situation in which people have their bodily autonomy stripped away in order to save a life - no mandatory blood, bone marrow, or organ donation. So why should women have this inflicted on them?

And your argument (that a foetus is a precious human life etc) means that there logically shouldn't be exceptions for rape, incest, age, foetal disability, or mental health issues - a woman or girl who isn't able to procure an abortion in time (for whatever reason) should be forced to carry that pregnancy to term, in your opinion, never mind the hideous emotional toll.

And then what? She's forced to either give up a part of herself - that she didn't even want - at birth, relinquishing baby up for adoption and never knowing if it has a safe life, and knowing that one day it might come to find her. Or more likely, she ends up raising a child that she resents/hates and doesn't want - well that won't go wrong at all!!

No one benefits from forcing women and girls to bear children that they don't want. All it does is cause suffering.

Why is it obviously wrong that a child going into care from birth would be better off aborted, if its own mother actually wants to abort it? (Clearly Im not talking about a third party taking that decision

It feels eugenics-adjacent to a lot of people: like you are explicitly saying that it’s better off to not exist at all than to exist as a poor person or in a neglectful home (standards of which is going to be different due to cultural backgrounds as well).

Even I wouldn’t go as far as this. But it was the assumption of Margaret Sanger and other early 20th century eugenicists that you wanted to suppress the birth rates of ‘unfit’ people. I am conflicted: I wonder why we don’t just sterilize women who are homeless and/or severely mentally ill, who have child after child because they are unable or unwilling to prevent it. People will say it’s discriminatory towards the poor. But yet, attitudes like the above reveal that people really do think that it’s better to not exist than to be born into poverty or an unstable, neglectful home.